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Native Bee Inventory and Monitoring Lab; Photographer: Erika Tucker · 9
Isodontia mexicana - face |
Native Bee Inventory and Monitoring Lab; Photographer: Erika Tucker · 9
Isodontia mexicana - mesepisterum |
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Native Bee Inventory and Monitoring Lab; Photographer: Erika Tucker · 9
Isodontia mexicana - thorax |
Native Bee Inventory and Monitoring Lab; Photographer: Erika Tucker · 9
Isodontia mexicana - topview |
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Native Bee Inventory and Monitoring Lab; Photographer: Erika Tucker · 9
Isodontia mexicana |
© Copyright John Ascher, 2006-2014
· 6
Isodontia mexicana, Mexican grass-carrying wasp |
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© Copyright John Ascher, 2006-2014
· 6
Isodontia mexicana |
Linda Dahlberg 2011 · 1
Isodontia mexicana |
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Linda Dahlberg 2012 · 1
Isodontia mexicana |
Linda Dahlberg 2012 · 1
Isodontia mexicana |
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Linda Dahlberg · 1
Isodontia mexicana |
Bohart, R.M., Menke, A.S. 1963 · 0
Isodontia mexicana, map |
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Overview |
Taken from:
Bohart, R.M., Menke, A.S. 1963. A Reclassification of the Sphecinae: With a Revision of the Nearctic Species of the Tribes Sceliphronini and Sphecini.
Male.—Average length 16 mm; black, thorns with bluish tint; posterior tibiae sometimes with reddish tints; wings clear in cellular area, suffused with brown along anterior margin, veins black brown; erect hair of body white, that of face partly brown; face, pronotal ridge, metapleuron above hind coxa with appressed silver pubescence; sternites V—VII with transverse bands of dark brown cilia; flagellomere I longer than II; apex of sternite VIII emarginate; genitalia about as in figure 65.
Female.—Average length 17 mm.
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Names | |
Isodontia (Murrayella) mexicana (Saussure)
(Fig. 22)
Sphex apicalis Harris, 1835, in: Hitchcock, Rpt. Geol. Mineral. Bot. Zool. Massachusetts, p. 588. Nomen nudum.
Sphex apicalis Saussure, 1867, Reise der list. Freg. Novara, Zool., 2:38. Syntypes, ♀♀, ♂♂, Illinois, Tennessee, Kansas (GENEVA). Preoccupied by Sphex apicalis Smith, 1856, p. 262.
Sphex apicalis mexicana Saussure, 1867, Reise der Ost. Freg. Novara, Zool., 2:38. Holotype ♂, Orizaba, Mexico (GENEVA).
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Geographic distribution | |
Distribution.—I. mexicana occurs throughout the United States east of the Rockies and ranges south through Texas into Mexico and Central America (fig. 22). In the west it is known only from southern Arizona and Sonora, Mexico. It was introduced into Hawaii (Oahu) some time after 1940, and recently into France (S. Kelner-Pillault, correspondence).
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Natural history | |
Bohart has studied the type of mexicana. Because of mistaken synonymy by Fernald (1906), this species has generally been known as harrisi (Fernald). Fernald confused apicalis Smith, 1856, page 262, with this species; and apparently unaware that homonymy no longer existed owing to Kohl’s (1890) renaming of apicalis Smith, 1856, page 253, proposed the name harrisi. I. harrisi then becomes an unnecessary new name for Isodontia (Isodontia) apicalis Smith.
This species is close to elegans but the rather consistently black body and appendages, wing color, lack of postscutellar silver appressed pubescence, and the reduction of it on the metapleuron are diagnostic for mexicana.
Biology.—Fernald (1906) recorded Gryllidae (Oecan thus sp.) as prey. The interesting account of Hubbard (1896) probably pertains to this species. He observed females nesting inside pitcher-plants (Sarracenia variolaria) in Florida. The wasp stuffed the pitcher with a floating mat of grass and plant fibers. Englehardt (1928) reported nests in the dead rolled leaves of yucca plants in Texas. Tettigoniids (Rehnia spinosa Caudell) were used as prey. Grasshopper nymphs, spiders, and crickets were also reported as prey by H. B. Parks in an annotation to Englehardt’s paper, but the validity of the spider record is doubtful.
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Updated: 2024-04-25 15:17:13 gmt
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